Sunday, May 10, 2009

More and more airlines are starting to involve themselves with new media, but I’m not convinced that many of them know what they’re doing. I don’t need a bunch of tweets about a new fare sale to Zimbabwe, but I do need fast answers to questions and good access to the people who have those answers.

Some airlines host their own channels on YouTube, which I occasionally raid for all your blog-entertainment needs. But it struck me that the American Airlines video (from March, and yes American posts less frequently) on its "Road Warrior" competition and a Southwest vid promoting new coffee definitely projected their separate corporate identities, or at least how their ad agencies want to present them.

I had the chance to sit down with US Airways’ Managing Director of Customer Strategy Tim Lindeman and Director of Customer Strategy, Melody Anderson (yes, the customer strategy group needs a lot of “directing”) to talk about what US Airways is doing in the world of baggage. You might be surprised to know that it’s pretty cool. [-Ed… See this Malcolm Gladwell article in the New Yorker where he talks with TIBCO Founder Vivek Randive… “We’ve been working with some airlines,” he said. “You know, when you get on a plane and your bag doesn’t, they actually know right away that it’s not there. But no one tells you, and a big part of that is that they don’t have all their information in one place.]

John Romantic is the director of customer relations and central baggage resolution at US Airways. But he'd prefer that you simply think of him as your advocate at the airline. For the last nine months, he's had the unenviable job of improving the carrier's checkered reputation for customer service. I asked him how he's doing it.

I read with interest that Alaska Airlines was going to discontinue pillows and blankets for passengers in all of its 114 planes to reduce the spread of swine flu. Apparently keeping pillows and blankets on board means they could be infected with swine flu germs, which could make people sick. Pillows and blankets might get passed around, spreading the virus, so it’s better if they’re no longer an option, right?

The airline has announced a 37% cut in Mexico capacity starting July 2. The timing for this seems a bit off to me. Last week, other airlines announced capacity cuts in this focusing on May and June. US Airways actually announced that it hopes to have a full schedule to Mexico again on the same day. I’m sure there’s a reason, but it just seems a bit weird to wait to cut capacity for so long.

American Airlines’ CEO Gerard Arpey dared to dream. He slipped a comment into their recent earnings call which seemed rather off the wall, until Delta CEO Richard Anderson effectively repeated the idea. The proposal? Instead of paying commissions to agencies and websites that sell their fares, airlines would charge those agencies a fee for the right to display and sell their fares.

The activity actually began Thursday evening with a United “attempted” airfare hike (only for travel late June thru early August), followed by one instigated by Continental on Friday morning which had enough overlap to look very similar to partial matching - so over the weekend, we actually saw two airfare hike attempts, and some of the most ridiculous airfare filings I have ever tried to review as matching and rollbacks for both complicated matters tremendously, that and the fact the hike was targeted originally for July departures only.

When I visited Southwest’s operation at Dallas/Love Field last month, it wasn’t a normal day. It just happened to be the first day that the airline had launched its Load Planning System at Love and elsewhere in the system. This new system has the ability to really significantly improve Southwest’s baggage handling.

For four days, Southwest has revealed a city (or in yesterday’s case, an area) that would have a 50% discount on Wanna Get Away fares on all flights. Friday was Philadelphia, Saturday was Nashville, Sunday was Albuquerque, and Monday all Bay Area airports (SFO, OAK, SJC) were on sale.